When developer Herb Gardner launched his eco-homes line, he followed the LEED guidelines for environmentally responsible buildings.

Though Mother Earth thanked him, potential customers didn’t take notice. As the veteran home builder put it, no one cared if their kitchen counter tops were made from recycled materials.

So Gardner changed course and shifted into marketing gear. His newest line of town homes came in a different kind of green — as in cash in your pocket — from low-to-zero electric and gas bills. The pocketbook approach resonated with customers.

“We were putting a lot of money into homes for which there really wasn’t a tangible benefit to the buyers,” Gardner explained, describing the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design building concept. “I started thinking, how can we build homes that also help the marketing.

“We came up with this concept of putting enough solar power on top of the homes to generate electricity,” he said. Next, the homes were outfitted with all electric appliances to take full advantage of the solar arrays on the roof.

“The fact that I can tell people that they will have a small electric bill or no electric bill … that brings people in,” he said.

His company, City Ventures, has found a way to make a profit from an environmental product by building solar homes from scratch instead of after market. His five-year-old company is a twist on the booming solar-power conversion business. Sales are driven by a rebounding Southern California housing market predicted to grow through spring, combined with an environmentally aware customer base seeking in-city living near train stations or freeway entrances.

City Ventures sold out of their solar-electric town homes in Signal Hill, Carson, Covina, Alhambra, Camarillo, Azusa, Downey and Buena Park. Solar-energy subcontractors were installing the wiring for solar rooftop systems earlier this month at its latest project in Bellflower, a 67-unit solar-electric development with town homes starting at $399,000.

Gardner sold his 700th solar-electric town home in March, part of an $18 billion bump in solar power investment in 2014 nationwide, with California leading all other states by a wide margin. Newport Beach-based City Ventures may be piggy-backing onto a mandate for all-solar homes in Lancaster, the fifth-largest city in Los Angeles County. All new homes in the high-desert city must be built with solar panels as of Jan. 1, 2014. With statewide targets to cut greenhouse gases and smog, plus falling prices on photovoltaic panels, solar could become the first choice for new homes in California’s near future.

“Looking at the financials, it absolutely makes sense to provide solar at the construction of a home,” said Jonathan Parfrey, executive director of Climate Resolve, a Los Angeles nonprofit promoting alternative energy. “This is where the economics are going.”

Gardner isn’t bashful about saying his goal is the bottom line. He’s using a concept for building green homes that will make him lots of green. “We found a way to help the environment, help Mother Earth and actually save people money. And, we do it profitably,” he said.

No gas whatsoever

To take full advantage of a 2-kilowatt solar panel system on every City Venture townhome, the whole house has to run on electricity.

Electric air conditioner. Check. Electric water heater. Yup. Electric stove and oven. Check, but developers installed induction range cook tops that heat up only when needed. Electric furnace? Check. Again, they got creative by using an electric heat-pump system.

Many of these appliances are more expensive, Gardner admits. But the company saved money by not running any natural gas lines. So the costs cancel out, he said.

Garages are wired for an electric cars. The homeowner can choose to buy a super-charging station or simply plug into the provided 110- or 120-volt outlet.

Each homeowner spends between $0 and $10 a month for electricity. And pays no gas bill. The solar-electric system provides 35 percent of the power, the rest comes from the grid. But that lowers a homeowner’s bill because he or she doesn’t pay higher-tiered pricing, he said.

The solar-electric concept works for square footage between 1,400 and 2,300. His larger homes, such as the Ambassador project in West Pasadena at two to three-times the space, are not equipped with solar power, he explained.

“Most of the people who buy our town homes are single or a couple, so the energy usage is not the same as an average single-family home,” Gardner explained.

It’s all about the green

Natasha Zabaneh, 28, was nervous. She was about to receive her electric bill after adding a second roommate and plugging in her hybrid-electric car every night.

The bill? $128. That is for the year, from March 2014 to March 2015.

“My entire electric bill is $10 a month. And that is with an extra person and an electric car,” she said.

Zabaneh is one of at least five employees of City Ventures who bought solar-electric homes after listening to the same spiels given to customers.

She bought hers in Signal Hill 3½ years ago. “It is a great deal. And it works. I was totally blown away when I got my first electric bill.” Because the bills are so small, she pays hers annually.

Inaya Bajwa, who doesn’t work for City Ventures, lives in a solar-electric, three-story, 2,300 square foot town home in Downey.

During a recent afternoon, several pots of Indian food bubbled on the convection stove. Lunch for herself and her mother-in-law, then a visit to the nearby temple in Cerritos, were on the day’s agenda.

She paid about $500,000 for her home which she called “a little expensive” but worth it. Part of her and her husband’s decision-making included saving money on utility bills. “We thought of buying here so we could get rid of high electricity bills,” she said.

In the last 10 months — including a hot summer in which she ran the air conditioning a lot — Bajwa said electric bills ran about $10 a month.

While she’s no expert on solar energy, she enjoys comparing bills with others in the complex. While it took some getting used to, she says she likes living in an all-electric home.

“Even a few of my friends were thinking of getting their houses installed with solar panels. I tell them it is a good option,” she said.

Steve Scauzillo covers environment and transportation for the Southern California News Group. He has won two journalist of the year awards from the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club and is a recipient of the Aldo Leopold Award for Distinguished Editorial Writing on environmental issues. Steve studied biology/chemistry when attending East Meadow High School and Nassau College in New York (he actually loved botany!) and then majored in social ecology at UCI until switching to journalism. He also earned a master's degree in media from Cal State Fullerton. He has been an adjunct professor since 2005. Steve likes to take the train, subway and bicycle – sometimes all three – to assignments and the newsroom. He is married to Karen E. Klein, a former journalist with Los Angeles Daily News, L.A. Times, Bloomberg and the San Fernando Valley Business Journal and now vice president of content management for a bank. They have two grown sons, Andy and Matthew. They live in Pasadena. Steve recently watched all of “Star Trek” the remastered original season one on Amazon, so he has an inner nerd.